The fundamental and the brute

Philosophical Studies - This paper distinguishes bruteness from fundamentality by developing a theory of stochastic grounding that makes room for non-fundamental bruteness. Stochastic grounding...     

Psychologische Mess- und Testverfahren

The use of psychological assessment methods is flawed by incorrect assumptions of their capacity. Some of these assumptions are discussed. It is argued that psychological tests are necessary to expand the database for expert reports about the impact of mental disorders on work and different levels of functioning. Tests help to protect psychological assessments against errors and chance bias. With respect to levels of functioning, examples of German tests and questionnaires are given. Test-based information requires objective validation methods and should not be subordinated to an intuitive assessment strategy.     

Synchronizing movements with the metronome: nonlinear error correction and unstable periodic orbits.

The control of human hand movements is investigated in a simple synchronization task. We propose and analyze a stochastic model based on nonlinear error correction; a mechanism which implies the existence of unstable periodic orbits. This prediction is tested in an experiment with human subjects. We find that our experimental data are in good agreement with numerical simulations of our theoretical model. These results suggest that feedback control of the human motor systems shows nonlinear behavior.     

Linear phase correction models for synchronization: parameter identification and estimation of parameters.

Linear phase correction models for synchronized tapping and their stochastic properties are presented. In the most general form they include a central timer, a motor execution, and a phase correction mechanism that acts on the physical or the perceived asynchrony. A central issue of the article is how to identify and estimate the model parameters from the data. Monte Carlo simulations show serious problems of parameter interdependency.